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One more reason I’d really like a teleporter

On Sunday afternoon, after a long afternoon of children’s party and swimming in the pool, I went indoors to check y mobile phone and discovered that it would not turn on. It took no charge, either plugged in to a regular socket, or plugged into my computer with a different cord, for any length of time. This in conjunction with the ‘e’ key on my laptop having been broken for a while, I figured it was time to head up to the Apple store the next morning.

I started off bright and… well, mid-morning, only to have a christmass tree of lights come on when I was partway up the highway. Pushing the gas pedal had no effect. I threw on my flashers and veered to the breakdown lane, discovering in the process that my power steering had gone. By the power of inertia, I rolled to the offramp, and came to a halt.

There was me, with two kids, on a sunny offramp, in a dead car.

With a dead phone.

I opened the hood and tied a plastic bag to my antenna to signal for help to the passing motorists. I lost track of how many passing motorists there were, looking at me, after 30. By the time a very nice man named Chris stopped, I was in tears. He was very kind, calling the state police for me, and giving my children bottles of water and gatorade from the back of his car. We stared into the engine compartment together, and he pointed out how the serpentine belt was slack, and told me that was likely the culprit, which is good because those are far cheaper than an alternator.

There was a spendy tow to the garage my family uses – I just HAPPENED to have on me a carefully hoarded sum of cash left over from a yard sale, plus enough pulled from two separate bank accounts, to cover it. I’m at least glad I WAS able to cover it. What do they do when you don’t have the money? Does the tow company keep the car on the truck?

My father came to pick my kids and I up from the nice air conditioned waiting room, and we proceeded up to get lunch and hit the Apple Store, where they resurrected my phone and Macguyvered a fix for my E key that saved me $200 – which is good, because as previously mentioned, I’d just spent that amount on the tow.

I’d been told on Monday that they’d know what the problem was by the next day. They only finally just called me, to tell me that the problem was in fact a massive leak in my power steering pump, which had sprayed fluid all over the belt, which slipped off. The pump and belt both need replacing, with labor and tax to the tune of half a grand.

So I’ve returned the Pick Your Things! Widget from the preorder sale to the left sidebar, so that anybody who wishes to purchase books to Help The Bliss can do so. The 20% discount for both books still applies, and you’ll still get the signing and the fun extras that were part of the preorder sale.

If you’ve already purchased books but still want to help, donations can be sent via PayPal to bliss.morgan@gmail.com – or messages of floatyhearts and cheering-up can go to bliss@callmebliss.com